Thanks so much sloppyhousewife.  Gonna make sure to back this up this time.

I haven't avoided using their features, I've avoided adding their unnecessary subhoods.  I still use the objects and features that came with them.  I don't need a downtown and shopping district to play with the features of those EPs.

Cause I don't want/need/use it?  Like Mootilda said, I can't see adding extra subhoods when I'm not using them.  I could have sworn that I used to have a mod like this.  I'm probably mistaken though.

This box pops up every time I enter my 'hood and I'm wondering if anyone can point me towards a mod to nix it. 

"It looks like some of your expansion packs have no associated neighborhoods....."

I could have sworn that I used to have one, but I've been searching everywhere I can think of and can't seem to find one. "It looks like some of your expansion packs have no associated neighborhoods....."

I performed this step and upon restarting my computer, my display settings have returned to the defaults.  My desktop wallpaper, the color of my taskbar, the stupid language bar was back, etc.  My computer otherwise seems to be running fine, but have I done something terribly wrong here?  I know it was this step because prior to doing it I had restarted windows, and restarted again after.

Ooh, me too please.  I purchased the game but haven't installed it yet.  If I install from a pirated image instead of the disk I bought, will I still get the secuROM crap?  I am afraid to let this disk anywhere near my computer. 

Um, just wanted to pipe in and say that I also had a problem extracting the floor files.  I used ExtractNow, and 7zip, and both times I got an error on all but the first file.  I redownloaded the files, and still had a problem.  May just be me, I will try again.

I have the same exact problem.  I'm pretty sure I am doing everything correctly.  This was working perfectly before I put pets in last night, now the game crashes upon creating "Pets."  What seems strange to me is that I haven't renamed anything related to pets.  I renamed the N001 folder, and have put in the empty templates.  This does not happen with previously created neighborhoods though.  The game is able to create "Pets" and with no problem.

Ok, I'm a total dum-ass and completely non-awesome.  I just attached a bunch of custom terrain sub-hoods with the empty templates in place, and wouldn't 'ya know, no new characters.  I made a new custom neighborhood using Jordi's method, then attached sub-hoods with the empty templates, and SimPe is showing no sim descriptions aside from the normal therapist, reaper, etc., and no SWAF.  Don't know why I thought the templates only worked when attaching the maxis-made sub-hoods, but I was mistaken.  Apologies to all for my dumb questions.

The empty templates are great, but I get sick of the same neighborhood terrains.  I'm hoping to find a way to create sub-neighborhoods with custom terrains to install without creating any characters. 

By the way, thanks Jordi for this tutorial.

Will the no regen hacks stop the game from creating downtownies and dormies when you first attach a subhood?  I thought that the game still created the default downtownies and dormies when attaching a custom subhood even when the no regen hacks were installed.

Are there any really detailed instructions somewhere on how to make my own replacements? 


You are absolutely correct about that.

I also would love to find decent maternity replacements.  I have searched MTS2 and other sites, but while I can find a ton of maternity clothing to use with squinge's mod, I can't find any defaults.  Which do you use Gwill? 

This sounds great!  Thanks Jordi for sharing this.  I have a question though.  If I rename the D001 template in the Nightlife install folder woul it enable me to create a custom downtown that was clean?  Or do the downtownies get created from something else?  I like to have all custom hoods and sub-hoods with no townies, downtownies or dormies.  If this method works for all of those as well, it would save me a ton of hassle.  I could use the empty templates, but then I am stuck with the default terrains.

Ah, I understand now    And you are correct.  I was only thinking about financial things, but loads of personal data is more important.  Before I did my reformat I backed up about 8 dvds worth of stuff, and I'm sure I'll find that I missed something.

Great.  I will try checking the cables and hope that that is all it is.  But I won't hold my breath. 


Whats so bad about them?  Or were you being sarcastic?  I've replaced hard drives before without too much trouble.  Of course getting a new computer would be easier... guess I'll have to work on the fiance for that one.

Thanks Jordi, I will try this now.

edit - I just ran the program, tried it twice and got the same error message each time:

Number of physical drives in the trace file is 0
Trace file has invalid system configuration information

So...is this a hard drive problem?  Or can I somehow change the configuration settings?  The program just shuts down after I click ok on the error message.

I should have mentioned that I attempted that before I broke down and reformatted.  I usually use scandisk, disk cleanup and defrag every month (that I remember, anyway), and I do regular virus and adware scans. 

It seems amazing to me how differently my computer is running now as opposed to how it was a few weeks ago.  When I click on a big folder, like my music or picture folders, I get that stupid hourglass for minutes before it displays the contents, whereas it used to pop up before I could blink.  My first thought was malware, but I scanned with every reputable program I could find.  And I am very anal about what gets put on my system.  I haven't even installed anything new or changed any settings since before it was running well.

Also, for about a day my computer was not recognizing either of my optical drives.  I have a DVD/CD burner and a CD reader.  They were not listed in My Computer, nor were they even attempting to read anything I put in them.  I turned the computer off and went to bed, and then next day they were back.  Not sure what that was about, but it has never happened before.   It seems to me (and I hope I'm wrong) that my computer is dying a slow death.  I'm afraid to even use it anymore aside from the internet, because I'm waiting for it to die and I don't want to lose anything.  It seems to be getting slower and weirder everyday.   

I have an Emachine (bleh) that is about two years old.  Two weeks ago it suddenly began taking an extremely long time to boot up.  Actually, it seemed to boot up normally, but it would sit at a blank screen after the windows loading screen for about 5 minutes before bringing up the blue login screen.  I scanned for viruses and adware, nothing.  So I did a full system recovery hoping that would fix it.  It didn't, and it's getting worse.  It now takes forever to open files, and even longer to open a folder with many files in it.  I don't know a ton about computers so I was hoping that someone could give me an idea of what might be wrong.  I was thinking it was possibly a hard disk problem, since it seems to only affect opening files and folders. 

Don't know if specs would be helpful, but it's an AMD Athelon XP 3000, 512 memory, a GeForce FX 5200 with 256 memory.  I installed the graphics card myself two years ago when I bought the computer, if it makes a difference.  I've been wanting to build a new machine for a while, but wasn't planning on doing it until after Christmas, so I would like to figure out what's wrong with this one.  Any ideas?

I'm going against popular opinion as well.  I think restricting crafting benches is a good idea.  And I also don't have any problem with refining the rules as more playtesting is done.  It is rare that anything comes out perfectly in the first edition.  Almost everyting needs updated as new holes appear. 
This works the other way around as well.  The simmer can decide the hell with the rules and play the challenge as he feels fit.  It is just a game for fun after all.   

You are right jsalemi, it is only a very small mention.  It doesn't go into detail at all about it, which is most likely why I'm confused.  I'm gonna go and play around with it some more tonight and maybe I can figure it out.  I think the playable were unemployed when I tried it, but I will double check and give it another try.  Thanks for the idea, I wouldn't have thought of that.

I did read the manual.  And in the manual it states that you can assign a playable sim to the stove.  Perhaps you should read the manual 



How do you get them to show up?  I assign, and give them start and end times, bit they never come.

I decided just the other day to try out christianlovs Ain1 thing, but I want to use it to employ other playable sims.  Since I refuse to read through nearly 2000 posts at MTS2, I'll ask you guys - how the heck to you get that to work?  I've been assigning and setting hours, but I have yet to have the assigned sim ever show up.

Might someone be able to send me the TV also?  I would appreciate it.   Email is just my user name @yahoo.com.

OK, thanks guys.  I thought I might have messed up somewhere.  I'm relieved that I don't have to start again.  It is nice to know whats going on in my game.  Kinda strange about the robots.  I wonder why they need to be treated as a sim.